textproduct: Quad Cities

KEY MESSAGES

- A very sharp backdoor cold front will continue to sweep southward through our area through the afternoon and evening.

- Showers and storms remain possible along and just behind this front, with severe weather possible, especially in our southern areas.

- Blustery weather will be in place this evening through Friday evening as cold weather spreads over the region, followed by another significant warm up, with rain chances in the extended forecast.

SHORT TERM /THROUGH FRIDAY/

Issued at 218 PM CDT Thu Mar 26 2026

At dawn today, a somewhat stationary front was draped over Iowa and Illinois, with generally light winds either side of it. Since then, a weak wave of low pressure has moved east along the front, allowing the west portion to drop south quickly as a sharp cold front. That wave is now heading towards Chicago, noted by increased northeast winds at DBQ this past hour hitting 36 kts! The surface front at 1 PM, is now south of the Quad Cities. Our warm day has been replaced by clouds and increasingly cool northeast winds. Before this moved to Burlington, we tied the record high for today at 84F!

Some quickly moving showers and storms have moved east through the area early this afternoon and late morning, and these are associated with instability located at 500mb and above, as noted on our 18Z Upper air sounding. Regarding surface based storms, well, we're very much capped at this time by a strong EML/cap centered at 800mb. This unsaturated warm nose will continue to limit surface parcels through the afternoon today, which now is showing up in the latest WoFS runs today. This scenario was described well, and preferred by our overnight shift, and now looks to be verifying. Thus our lower level instability should not be used until CAA occurs in that layer later this evening, when the depth of the northeast flow increases, effectively allowing storms to form along the elevated front tonight. While normally, I'd be quite concerned that that timing would favor LLJ interacting with the front, we're already veered strongly to the west to west northwest already. Thus, it's a race to see if moisture can remain in those levels sufficient for strong storms to form, as that cap erodes through CAA. Either way, the event is delayed to evening, and now probably south of the I-80 corridor, except for very high based activity mentioned above.

The initial storm development will be the most supportive of large hail, given the steep lapse rates aloft, and cool air aloft. However, given that lack of moist flow to interact wit these storms, the activity should weaken below severe risk rather quickly tonight, leaving us with generally a 5 PM to 9 PM risk for mainly hail in our southern and eastern counties. The coverage of rain and thunder may peak closer to 10 PM but we should be seeing that focus for new storms to shift out of the area by then too.

Brisk cooler conditions tonight and tomorrow will continue into the weekend and bring some elevated fire weather risk both Friday and Saturday. GFDI values of 15 to 22 are currently forecast with northwest winds Friday and southwest winds Saturday.

LONG TERM /FRIDAY NIGHT THROUGH WEDNESDAY/

Issued at 218 PM CDT Thu Mar 26 2026

Sunday through mid week continues to look much warmer again, with periodic shower and thunderstorm chances as active flow aloft sets up over the region. This is due to a re-bounding western upper high and strengthening thermal ridge to our southwest will build northeastward again starting another warming trend across the area Saturday and especially into the end of the longer range. Ensembles continue to bring a piece of ridge-riding wave energy with some moisture return to produce the next round of showers and thunderstorms Monday night into Tuesday. Along with this chance their may be the potential for stronger storms again. Then even longer range guidance continues to show an active pattern evolving if the western CONUS upper trof can get established.

AVIATION /00Z TAFS THROUGH 00Z SATURDAY/

Issued at 612 PM CDT Thu Mar 26 2026

The last of the lingering -SHRA will exit to the east within the first hour or two of the period, with MVFR CIGS bcmg VFR a few hours after that as skies gradually thin out as approach 12z. A defined mixed layer is evident within model soundings which could keep a few stubborn low to mid level clouds around through 12z due to continuous 360-020 flow, at which time we dry out enough to lose the mixed layer briefly which should also result in SKC to FEW250 for a few hours. As we approach 18z, fair weather clouds return from SCT/BKN050 as mixing returns, alongside gusts approaching 20-25kts from 340-360. As far as individual sites, conditions should be similar across them all except for the first hour or two of lingering showers which based off the radar at 23z looks to be transient at best. Overall aside from the early part of the period, we should see mainly VFR conditions with some breezy winds during daylight on the 27th.

DVN WATCHES/WARNINGS/ADVISORIES

IA...None. IL...None. MO...None.